lax culture from an insider

[Anonymous]

We have a son in the Lower School and hadn't noticed that there are references to the Huguely family on the school site and in school literature. Landon has a lot of positives to celebrate and has been a good experience for our family. I do as a parent find it deeply offensive if what was posted is true. If other kids were removed from records for their accomplishments while at the school and can see that George Huguely was not that is a bad message to send to the internal Landon community and a bad image to send to the outside community. Tolerable but not upstanding.

[Anonymous]

Landon is pathetic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Landon is pathetic

Cool story bro.

[Anonymous]

Are Prospect Days worthwhile, or just another money pit?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are Prospect Days worthwhile, or just another money pit?

Both. It is worth it if your club coach has communicated through that your son is being recruited and they want to see him there. But at base level it is a was for the college programs to get their underpaid assistants some additional income. I'd say rely on your club coaches if you feel you can trust their inputs. Just signing up for a bunch of these without some qualifying is a waste of time and money.

[Anonymous]

Do all boys who participate in the Nov recruitment tournaments get follow up emails from colleges? In other words, mass emails? Or if you get one, does that signify true interest?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do all boys who participate in the Nov recruitment tournaments get follow up emails from colleges? In other words, mass emails? Or if you get one, does that signify true interest?

That goes back to the first reply. Yes, in less than 5% instances at most coaches want to see you at their prospect day and will use it to evaluate. The other 95%+ are $$$ paying customers who are just paying for a day of lacrosse at a D1 college and get to take a penny home. If your club coach is being straight with you, he will tell your family if there is interest in advance of the sign ups. College coaches won't and can't call you unsolicited to ask for your son to be there. All the advance communication is third party...club and college coaches speaking about the short list of kids from that club who are on the radar or not. Can a kid show up at a prospect day and light it up? Sure, but my impressions are that is really unlikely. Unfortunately a lot of D1 lacrosse recruit profiles is a staged game. Club and prep coaches can sell ice to a lacrosse coach Eskimo if there is an agenda to help a kid or family for any reason, but that reason is usually money the grateful club coach after years of fees, camps and clinics. I've seen that happen and have also been at prospect days where the head coach was checking his smart phone or leaving early while the assistants administer the event. The bottom line is prospect days are a lucrative event that is very easy to put on which supplements the low assistant coach salaries. We went to three of these last year and did not even get a polite email back after for "thanks for attending", which is as much a slight to the kids as it is just bad business and manners. Then my son played well in the summer and got offers from a few top 10 D1 programs, albeit not the same ones. In summary I can speak to our family mistake and money waste...we went to a few of these which were my son's early "want list" and those were not the same programs that telegraphed any interest in him. And he was in fall of his 9th grade. Any kid with a want list in 9th grade is, well, just a kid who will change his mind over and over just like picking out sneakers. In the end my son's early want list was flawed because they were not the best academic schools, and in the end what was right for him arrived later. And what arrived later was a place where he skipped even the spring and summer prospect events.

I would watch my family lacrosse budget better if I had to do again. You would fill 20 weekends this school year with lacrosse prospect or other recruiting linked events and it is hard to trust what is an investment from what is a waste. Unfortunately that means trusting your club coach and owners. Frankly, I learned to appreciate that my son plays for a good club with good coaching but I think very little of the owner and the recruiting misinformation from the coaches. Remember, most club coaches and college assistant coaches are twenty or early thirty something ex-college players themselves and it is a very tight buddy system. Will your club coach cajole you into prospect days and many other things to "get noticed, get recruited" knowing all that will come of it is your money into the lacrosse machine even if he knows your son is not suited for D1 lacrosse or a specific program? Yes. That is just a sad truth. Be realistic about how strong your son is at lacrosse, determine what kind of school is best (scratch out Ivy if B student or shoot higher than the State U's if he is an exceptional student) and most important understand that in the end college lacrosse will change little for your son. The scholarship dollars are low and the best of all worlds is you can use the NCAA coaches to help your son through admissions into a competitive school. Anyone telling you different is selling you something or their own vanities. If there is a DMV lacrosse dad of a D1 committed kid not telling everyone his kid is on a full ride, I haven't met him yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Landon is pathetic

Cool story bro.

lol - it was well thought out and had a lot of resources to back it up too. A+

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are Prospect Days worthwhile, or just another money pit?

Any recommendations for non-Division I prospect days that are worthwhile?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are Prospect Days worthwhile, or just another money pit?

Any recommendations for non-Division I prospect days that are worthwhile?

There are a number of excellent academic schools that play D2 or D3 lacrosse. I'd suggest your son email the coach at a school he has an interest in. What will come back is a basic "thank you for your interest, we can't contact you first directly save for sending you this athlete questionnaire". You son replies with the questionnaire filled in for school, grades, lacrosse club, etc. details. Then your son is on an email list for all prospect days or other items of interest for interested student athletes. A good additional step is for the parents to email or call the D2 or D3 coach once to introduce and stating you'd like to meet him with your son when you go to that campus for a visit and admissions tour. I'd repeat that D1 prospect days are 95%+ money grab and only nominally a forum to get noticed. I'd guess that D2 and D3 ones are the same to some extent, but kids and families who make an effort to go to them are more likely to be showing a real interest in the school for non-lacrosse reasons as well and that should be well received. I hope this is helpful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a son in the Lower School and hadn't noticed that there are references to the Huguely family on the school site and in school literature. Landon has a lot of positives to celebrate and has been a good experience for our family. I do as a parent find it deeply offensive if what was posted is true. If other kids were removed from records for their accomplishments while at the school and can see that George Huguely was not that is a bad message to send to the internal Landon community and a bad image to send to the outside community. Tolerable but not upstanding.

Sounds like you are picking up the landon drill. Tolerable but not upstanding in Latin is their school motto.

[Anonymous]

My 9th grader will be playing a series of "recruitment" tournaments over the next few weeks with his club team. What should he expect (I know, a vague question, but any and all information/responses would be appreciated).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My 9th grader will be playing a series of "recruitment" tournaments over the next few weeks with his club team. What should he expect (I know, a vague question, but any and all information/responses would be appreciated).

November is notorious for sloppy lacrosse in lousy weather where colleges and club coaches are in a tizzy over the evaluations. I would say invest a couple hundred dollars now in a video camera with a tripod and film it. To the extent you can clip together 3-4 minutes of highlights for your son, that is what you will live off of for the next 6 months. All of these tournaments have paid videographers, and it is a rip-off. You will save the couple hundred over and over again in the next year or two.

You can expect that coaches will populate the sidelines in their chairs to watch halves of games and may go from field to field. Despite the risks of parent / club coach cajoled "me time" play, remember that coaches want to sit and watch two good lacrosse teams playing good lacrosse. Evaluations are useless when one team is beating up on a lesser team, or when your team is not in the winning bracket playing the other good teams in the tournament. So good team play is important and I hope your son's team does not regress into selfish play because of the adult pressures to show what they have as individuals. Frankly, our son played on an excellent 2017 team that played like crap last fall and was fraught with selfish play and that did adversely affect the early recruiting candidacy of some very good players on that team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 9th grader will be playing a series of "recruitment" tournaments over the next few weeks with his club team. What should he expect (I know, a vague question, but any and all information/responses would be appreciated).

November is notorious for sloppy lacrosse in lousy weather where colleges and club coaches are in a tizzy over the evaluations. I would say invest a couple hundred dollars now in a video camera with a tripod and film it. To the extent you can clip together 3-4 minutes of highlights for your son, that is what you will live off of for the next 6 months. All of these tournaments have paid videographers, and it is a rip-off. You will save the couple hundred over and over again in the next year or two.

You can expect that coaches will populate the sidelines in their chairs to watch halves of games and may go from field to field. Despite the risks of parent / club coach cajoled "me time" play, remember that coaches want to sit and watch two good lacrosse teams playing good lacrosse. Evaluations are useless when one team is beating up on a lesser team, or when your team is not in the winning bracket playing the other good teams in the tournament. So good team play is important and I hope your son's team does not regress into selfish play because of the adult pressures to show what they have as individuals. Frankly, our son played on an excellent 2017 team that played like crap last fall and was fraught with selfish play and that did adversely affect the early recruiting candidacy of some very good players on that team.

Thank you for the responsive and well-informed response. So what if a college coach is actually interested in a 9th grader. Do they send him an email? Talk to the coach? Aren't they prohibted from calling?

[Anonymous]

If a college coach is interested he will call or email your club coach. They cannot email or call you to initiate a dialogue.